Sweet Dreams (Colorado Mountain #2)(87)

But something stopped me and instead I whispered, “Okay, Captain.”

Chapter Fourteen

Your Own Brand of Trouble

“And all of it’s true. But none of it was true with you.”

My eyes opened and I stared at the dark pillowcase.

I was in Tate’s bed with Tate but he was far away. I could feel Buster’s little body weighing the covers down between us.

We hadn’t slept together very often but every time we’d done it either Tate held me close or I snuggled into his back.

Not that night.

After our exchange, he’d led me to the bed, made me get in it and ordered me to keep the ice on as long as I could. This was difficult since it was getting really cold but also I was uncomfortable because Tate still seemed really angry.

I’d lain there, holding the ice to my head while Tate cleaned up in the bathroom. Buster kept Tate company in the bathroom until he came out and then he left the bedroom without a word, Buster prancing after him. I heard Tate righting furniture and Buster came back, obviously not a big fan of hanging around while Tate was righting furniture. Buster leaped on the bed and curled up with me, I gave her scratches, saw the lights go out in the hall and Tate came back.

He took off his jeans and climbed into his side of the bed. He turned out the light and didn’t move to me, touch me or speak to me. He settled on his back with one arm behind his head, Buster abandoned me, walked over my belly and curled up against Tate.

He took his hand from behind his head and started rubbing Buster.

Then he said in a low, menacing voice, “I tell you to stay where you are and not to move, Ace, next time, do what I f**kin’ say.”

I blinked in the dark, my eyelids the only things that moved. The rest of my body was statue still.

There was a lot there I didn’t like. Firstly, Tate again telling me what to do and expecting me to do it, even when he was in a fistfight in his living room! Secondly, the intimation that my getting hit was my fault because I didn’t do what he told me to do when I was breaking up a fistfight in his living room! Lastly, Tate was again telling me what to do and he was clearly infuriated I didn’t do it.

If I had my car, I would have gotten up, gotten dressed and gone right to it.

Fuck that and f**k him!

I was better off at the hotel. It was below average but Ned and Betty never told me what to do and they had a pool.

But I was stuck in a house in the hills. It was night, it was dark and I had no way home.

So instead, I got out of bed and walked to his bathroom, dumped the dripping ice into his sink, rinsed and wrung out the kitchen towel Wood had put the ice in and hung it on a towel rail. Then I went back to bed and got in on my side, turned so my back was to Tate and closed my eyes.

He didn’t say another word and neither did I. He fell asleep way before me and still didn’t roll into me or reach out to me.

Apparently Tatum Jackson could be angry even in his sleep.

I eventually fell asleep and woke twice while words he’d said drifted through my head. I was able to get to sleep both times but this time, with Wood’s words floating through, words I didn’t understand but words I knew somewhere deep meant something huge, I knew I wouldn’t.

I tried, adjusting my position to my back, then my belly, then my other side and finally a combo of side and belly.

Nothing doing.

Instead of waking Tate with my fidgeting, I carefully got out of the bed and just as carefully walked through his bedroom, down the hall and into the living room. I went straight to the couch, stretched my legs out, pulled the blanket there over me but I twisted my upper body toward the window. I crossed my arms on the back of the couch, put my chin on them and looked out the window.

The moonlight made the trees and terraced plants silver.

“You don’t burden a good woman with that shit, baby. You find out, you’ll know. You get a shot at her, you hook her deep, then you lay that shit on her.”

I closed my eyes and the silver hillside turned to black.

“Let’s have this and not f**k it up. We’ll talk about Wood later. Yeah?”

I opened my eyes and stared at the plants and flowers, unruly, unkempt, but I knew not planted by Tate’s hands.

“You don’t get this because you don’t know Wood. I know Wood. Trust me, you knew Wood, you’d get it and you’d know you don’t owe him shit.”

I felt my lip tremble.

“The thing you gotta know before you climb back on the back of his bike is that Tate Jackson is trash too.”

I turned my head and looked at the six-seater dining room table.

Did a bachelor own a six-seater dining room table? I didn’t think so. Tate didn’t exactly strike me as a man who held dinner parties.

Maybe he played poker. Tate struck me as a man who might throw poker parties.

My eyes went back to the plants.

“In my life, three women have been on the back of my bike. One was his sister, who f**ked up my life. One was his ex, who f**ked up my life. Now it’s you, who’s been in his bed.”

I stared at the plants knowing it just by looking at them.

Neeta had lived there, or Bethany or, if not lived, then one of them was around long enough to put their stamp on it. Two women who f**ked up his life.

Now, me.

His “type”.

The type to f**k up his life?